Quotes from Katherine Mayfield

The only way to truly recover from a dysfunctional childhood and create an authentic life is to face your feelings, acknowledge them, express them freely, and let them go. Feelings are a normal part of being human, and they're meant to be fully expressed.

When we don't face our feelings and learn how to release them, each time a situation comes up that is similar to an experience that caused strong feelings in the past, we become "triggered" by all of the old, unresolved feelings, and we have a tendency to respond in a knee-jerk habitual fashion to the new situation instead of finding innovative, healthier ways to respond.

As you begin to see yourself, your family, and the old, outmoded behavior patterns that run your life with more clarity, you're taking steps to live more deeply from your authentic self.

I encourage you to set foot on a journey to a more authentic life, the same journey I wrote about in my memoir, The Box of Daughter: Healing the Authentic Self. Sharing our stories helps us heal ourselves, and as we share, we begin to heal ourselves, and in doing so, we help to heal the world.

Children have no frame of reference with which to understand that those rules are simply choices that his parents have made, and that other families and communities will have different styles of relating and behaving. His focus becomes narrow, he becomes less flexible, and may have trouble as an adult operating outside of the rules set for him by his parents.

In dysfunctional families, people overfocus on problems—even very small ones—without allowing any focus on the innumerable ways a child does things well. This is one of the primary causes of low self-esteem. A child can do ten, fifty, a hundred things right in a day, but an overly critical parent will pick out the one thing that doesn't go well, and harp on it over and over.

the fact that because I grew up in a dysfunctional family where there was a lot of tension and conflict, I have a tendency to fall into feeling like there's conflict all around me even when there isn't. Because struggle was a part of my life from day one, sometimes I unthinkingly create drama in my mind because it feels like "home." I forget that things can be easy, that life can go smoothly, and that I can get what I want.

My parents were deeply committed to service in the community – their willingness manifested in their volunteering and giving to others. But at home, the "struggle against" was pervasive because they never learned in their own dysfunctional families how to nourish themselves and other family members.

What is most important to understand about dysfunctional families is that in keeping the family "secrets," we are harming ourselves and diminishing our ability to be honest and open-hearted with ourselves and others we care about

The question to ask yourself is, Do you always or never do that? Or is it only once in a while? One of the favorite tricks of family bullies is to make criticisms global (blowing them out of proportion) so they seem much more important. Another favorite manipulation is to place a label on you, as in "Too bad you're not a better mother." How would someone know, since they don't see how you are with your kids day in and day out—only on special occasions?

We can't begin to free ourselves from a trap of seeing life in a certain way or believing certain things unless we realize that we're in a trap. Only then can we begin to break free.

Experiencing a sense of futility can be a way of denying an immense and terrifying buildup of frustration—a well of distress and disappointment at having needs ignored or belittled time after time after time—and it can affect an adult's relationships, career, and deepest sense of self.

If a small child's needs are not met with at least some regularity, there is a tremendous sense of frustration, of powerlessness to get anything that he or she needs. Over time, as the frustration builds up and is repressed again and again, it becomes too painful to face, and a sense of futility develops. If it isn't acknowledged and allowed expression, the frustration will continue to hide under the surface and grow into a feeling of futility.

Denying so much repressed rage requires tremendous energy—energy that could be used to create an authentic and exciting life.

This is the way out of helplessness and hopelessness. By following the thread of the anger back to its original source, and allowing the anger to express freely in a healthy manner, a seeker begins to understand why life appears to be the way it is (hint: we learn our worldview by mimicking someone else's, or we believe what they taught us about ourselves and the world without investigating for ourselves whether it's true or not).

Usually this is a result of having had to be hypervigilant as a child—especially if your family situation was chaotic or frightening—and consequently developing a habit of trying to see problems before they even show up.

When the source of the anger is understood and enough of the old feelings are released, the natural force behind the anger can be transmuted into intention. When the anger is fully expressed over time, the powerful energy that was used first to deny that it existed, then to facilitate its expression, still remains. This energy can be transformed into strength of purpose, power of intention to shape life the way we want it to be.

Growing up in a very dysfunctional family, I learned early in my life not to have high expectations. As a consequence, my ideas didn't often pan out. I guess I figured that if I didn't expect much, I wouldn't be disappointed. But instead, I ended up being disappointed most of the time.

All of this makes me realize that my parents never knew me. They never really knew who I was. They only knew the picture of who I was that they'd helped me create in response to their needs. How sad it is to think that these people who knew me for 50 years, who had given me life, never really knew who I am.

So if you've always been a "giver," take some time for yourself in your life – to stop, be still, to allow the Universe to nourish you. We all deserve nourishment, even if we were taught those many years ago that we didn't. And if you give it permission, the Universe is happy to provide.

Reality checks" are an extremely important tool for people who struggle with dysfunctional family dynamics.

The discovery that some of the behaviors in your family that you thought and felt were wrong or abnormal actually were abnormal is tremendously freeing and validating, and helps you learn to trust yourself. Don't be afraid to ask if something seems normal to someone else. Even though dysfunctional family dynamics are usually well-hidden behind the closed doors of many families, almost everyone experiences them.

And I wonder: is there a connection between high expectations and confidence, between low expectations and low self-esteem?

This runs a little contrary to the way we think affirmations should work, because when we're in a great mood, or getting what we want, we don't think about creating more of it. But this is exactly the time to create more of it – to expand that good feeling, to extend those good thoughts, to send that energy out into the Universe to create more of what you want.